


Wolves of Swift River

by waspabi



Category: Taylor Swift (Musician)
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/F, Magical Realism, Werewolves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-21
Updated: 2015-05-21
Packaged: 2018-03-30 10:14:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 18,559
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3932950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/waspabi/pseuds/waspabi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Karlie Kloss leaves her ballet class on a mild autumn evening and by the next morning, she’s a werewolf. </p><p>It’s a bit of a shock but Karlie likes to think of herself as a positive person, so she tries to adjust as quickly as possible. She googles <i>werewolves</i>. She googles <i>Missouri werewolves</i>, and finds out that there aren’t that many, at least not openly. She calls a werewolf helpline and talks to a comforting woman for an hour and a half about support strategies and the upcoming full moon. She tells her parents, and then she calls the werewolf helpline again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wolves of Swift River

**Author's Note:**

> This bananas explosion-town has nothing to do with anything in reality, at all, anywhere. If Taylor Swift and Karlie Kloss _are_ werewolves, they have done a truly excellent job of hiding their full moon activities and deserve a werewolf medal, probably. Some concepts and terminology in this fantasy story adventure were borrowed from Wolfblood, the surprisingly excellent CBBC supernatural drama. 
> 
> A semi-soundtrack for this fic can be found [here](http://8tracks.com/waspabi/wolf-pack) (more thematic than anything else as this fic is significantly more cozy than Sleigh Bells on repeat) and my tumblr lives over [here](http://waspabi.tumblr.com).
> 
> Massive thanks are due to Catie and Mary who kept me psyched on this fic and gave me some nice compliments, also Catie gave me good witch headcanons.

Karlie Kloss leaves her ballet class on a mild autumn evening and by the next morning, she’s a werewolf. 

It’s a bit of a shock but Karlie likes to think of herself as a positive person, so she tries to adjust as quickly as possible. She googles _werewolves_. She googles _Missouri werewolves_ , and finds out that there aren’t that many, at least not openly. She calls a werewolf helpline and talks to a comforting woman for an hour and a half about support strategies and the upcoming full moon. She tells her parents, and then calls the werewolf helpline again. 

“I’d strongly advise you to get to a more isolated environment before the full moon,” says the woman on the line, after Karlie’s stopped crying, “Most werewolves live in rural areas for that reason — and you may have noticed that city life has become more stressful than it used to be, before you were bitten.”

Karlie has noticed, but she doesn’t leave the city. Instead, she spends the first shift of her life scrambling through the streets of St Louis and wakes up naked and terrified under an oak tree in Forest Park. There’s blood under her fingernails and she devoutly hopes it’s squirrel, or coyote or something. All the internet stuff said she was supposed to feel exhilaration after a shift: a sense of power, connectedness to nature and probably masses of endorphins, seeing as wolves get rather a lot of exercise. 

What she feels is nothing like that. She feels like her body has been hollowed out and left achingly lonely, like there’s nothing for her hands to hold onto, like she wonders if she’s going to have to craft herself a dress out of oak leaves and grass before she gets cited for public indecency. There’s laws against werewolves shifting outside in populated areas. It’s not illegal to _be_ a werewolf in public, not exactly, but it’s not exactly… welcome. Definitely not in Missouri. 

After that she figures it’s best to get out of town. 

A witch she knew in elementary school tells her a rumor: somewhere in the mountains of the rural northeast, a girl called Taylor is collecting werewolves. She gives her the name of a bar in Manchester and Karlie doesn’t have any better ideas, so she packs up and spends half her meagre retail savings on a train ticket to New Hampshire. 

The Luna Tavern is hidden behind a sports bar in a red brick building downtown. Karlie wrinkles her nose at the onslaught of sweat and smoke inside. The woman behind the empty bar takes one look at her and asks, “That time of the month?” 

Karlie nods, grateful. That’s the password. She wouldn’t have remembered to say it otherwise. Her stomach lurches. 

“Through the staff door,” the bartender says, “Step careful. If they give you any hassle come right out and let me know.” 

Blood buzzes in Karlie’s ears. She orders a ginger ale, bites back about eighty questions and ducks through the staff door. A brick-walled hallway gives way to a long dimly lit space where about twelve people — twelve _werewolves_ — are scattered around throwing darts and sipping lager. Karlie commandeers a small table and scopes the sparse room, knuckles white against the cold glass. She sort of needs to pee but feels too nervous to try and find the restroom. 

A big guy with a baseball hat leans over her seat. “Tall, aintcha? Bet you’re a big wolf. Let me guess — russet. No, cream. You’d look lovely as a blonde, darling.” 

 _Wolf_. It’s the first time Karlie’s heard the word aloud when it referred to her. _Wolf_. She still doesn’t feel like one, even if the evidence was all over Forest Park two weeks ago. 

“I’m waiting for someone,” Karlie mumbles behind her hair, curling her toes in her flat ankle boots and cursing every polite impulse in her body. 

“Boyfriend? Pretty girl like you has to have a boyfriend. Bet he’s a big guy, huh, beautiful?” 

Karlie doesn’t say anything, just stares down at her ginger ale and wills him to fuck _off_ , just _fuck off_. 

“What’s your name, huh? I’m Jeff. Jeff Anderson. Why’re you so quiet, gorgeous? I just want to talk to you.” 

Karlie mumbles something indistinct. God, she wishes she were the sort of person who could tell him to fuck off right to his face — _Fuck off_ , she imagines saying, imagines flipping him off and throwing her drink in his eyes. She’s a _werewolf_ now, surely she wouldn’t have to be this nervous anymore, but he’s probably a werewolf too. Isn’t he?  

A girl with long, swinging hair slams a beer on the table right in front of Jeff Anderson. She’s tall — not quite as tall as Karlie, but who is — and carries herself like she’s got a couple scary knives hidden in her cowboy boots and a sword stashed under her short black dress, nunchucks in the pockets of her green army jacket. “‘Scuse me,” she says, “We’re busy.” 

Jeff eyes her edgily. “You one of Taylor’s girls?” 

“Bet your pimply ass.” The girl doesn’t threaten him, or tell him to fuck off, or do anything besides look him right in the eye and blink like, _you want something_? 

“I was just having a conversation,” Jeff says, but he sounds nervous now, “Just being friendly, like.” He backs away, muttering, and goes back to his friends.

The girl watches him go with a red smirk, then turns to Karlie and beams. “What a dick. Hi. I’m Este.” 

Karlie feels the smile spread across her face. All of a sudden, the dim room feels more welcoming. “I’m Karlie,” she says, and holds out a hand. 

When Karlie was a little girl, her mother told her over and over, _don’t talk to strangers. Don’t get in cars with strangers_. But Este doesn’t feel like a stranger. Something in Karlie’s gut, something with heavy fur and yellow eyes and sharp teeth, knows she’s going with her. 

Karlie has so many questions she’s not sure where to start — what are shifts like for other people, do werewolves get into trouble up here, how many wolves does Este know? The words come so fast they dry up her tongue and leave her new-girl-at-school shy, fiddling with her straw and gawking at Este like a confused woodpecker.

For her part, Este seems happy to chat until the ice in Karlie’s ginger ale melts, a loud stream of her flat Valley girl accent that makes Karlie think of _Clueless_. Quickly Karlie learns that Este moved here from California when she was fifteen but still hates the New Hampshire winters, that she was born a werewolf — _wolfblood,_ she calls it — and has two sisters who live with them. _Them_ is the part that sends Karlie’s lungs fluttering somewhere towards the ceiling. _Them_ is a pack. 

Karlie leans forward eagerly. “How many are you?” 

“Six so far. Sometimes seven, depending on guests.” Este waggles her eyebrows. “You want to come meet everybody?” 

Karlie wants to play it cool. She’s definitely going to play it cool. “ _Yes_ ,” she nearly squeaks, beaming, not even a little cool at all. 

Este leads her out into the parking lot. Their feet crunch over loose gravel and stones until she gestures to a hulking battered Chevy pickup truck. A shorter girl than Karlie would have to scramble up to get into the passenger seat. “Welcome to our number one truck beast, Rosalind.”

“Beautiful name for a beautiful creation,” Karlie says, and pats the rust red side. 

Este grins. “Harry named her.” 

“Harry?” Karlie hoists herself up into the passenger side. The cab holds a long bench seat and smells of gasoline and pine. Crumpled up receipts and discarded chapsticks line the floor. 

“He’s our token boy. We let him hang around so long as he’s seen and not heard.” The engine comes to sputtering life as Este turns the key and gets the pickup into gear. 

Evening climbs as they drive through endless forested highways, climbing mountains and hillsides under the shade of slate grey cliffs. The sky goes pastel peach, then dark dusky blue, until night falls and the crescent moon rises blue bright above the trees. Karlie touches the cold glass window with her fingertips and watches the land roll by. Este says they’re on a state highway but they only see about four other cars in an hour. At one point they have to stop to haul a massive tree branch off to the side of the road. 

“Not even Google Maps gets out here,” Este laughs, starting the Chevy up again. “Technically, it doesn’t believe the street we live on even exists.”

They pass a lake twenty minutes later. “Stay tuned for town,” Este says, “We have one entire traffic light. It’s crazy.” 

Sure enough, a singular traffic light has been strung up at an intersection that crosses one state route with another. There’s a gas station, a post office, a vet and a cluster of houses, everything nearly drowned out by the riotous foliage that rings red and yellow and orange even at night. 

“Welcome to Scythe, New Hampshire, former home of a _prestigious_ scythe-making factory, current home of Gilbert’s Seasonal Ice Cream Shoppe.” 

“Hopping,” Karlie says. 

“I think if I were human I’d, like, _hate_ it,” says Este, “But you know how it is with wolfbloods and cities. No-ooo likey.” 

They pass a white clapboard church, a few more houses and a big graveyard before town melts again into forest. Half a Britney Spears song later, Este turns into an unpaved drive. The truck clanks as it winds up the hill to an open clearing where a dusky pink Victorian sits perched on a grassy knoll overlooking the glassy surface of a small lake below. 

When Karlie was eleven her mom drove her to sleepaway summer camp for the first time and she remembers how it felt to see the rustic brown stick sign for Camp Witawka, the thrum drum of her heart a mix of thrill and trepidation, knees shaking in her cutoff jean shorts. Nothing much has changed, save eleven years and a werewolf bite. 

“It’s big, right?” Este laughs and pulls the Chevy up alongside an equally rundown Volkswagen bug. “Tay’s parents used to run a B&B here.” 

The air smells of evergreen and wood fires and crisp winter nights. It singes the inside of Karlie’s nose and makes her think of Christmas. She heaves her bag over one shoulder and swallows hard.

“Don’t be nervous. If we bite it’s not like it’ll do shit.” Este laughs at her own joke and takes Karlie’s bag for her. “C’mon kiddo. Let’s meet the pack.” 

Karlie would have assumed that cats wouldn’t love living cheek to jowl with a werewolf pack, but apparently she was wrong. A grey tabby waits on the front porch and yowls as Este gets the door open. She pushes past their legs to get inside, trotting down the hall and turning the corner. Este and Karlie follow the cat into a wide living room where two girls sit sprawled around a low-burning fire. With their pale oval faces and twin curtains of long, straight hair they couldn’t be anyone but Este’s sisters. 

“Ladies, may I present the unnervingly gorgeous Miss Karlie Kloss!” Este holds her arms like Vanna White, ushering Karlie forward. “Do you have a middle name, bee-tee-dubs?” 

Karlie tucks her hair behind her ears and grins nervously. “Elizabeth.” 

“Excellent. Queenly. Karlie Elizabeth Kloss! She’s from Missouri.” 

“Welcome to the _madhouse_ ,” crows the shortest one, scooping up the disgruntled tabby and waving its paws in Karlie’s direction. She’s wearing jean cutoffs and a big sweatshirt with the faded faces of *NSYNC emblazoned across the front. “I’m Alana, and this is Pebbles.” Pebbles yowls in protest. 

The other girl has a guitar balanced one one knee. Her hair is the darkest between the sisters and she has cool, intelligent eyes that seem to get the measure of Karlie in one sweep. She’s conspicuously quiet, just sitting back and letting her sisters shout over each other. 

“She’s so _tall_ ,” says Alana, “Selena’s going to be pissed.” 

“I am frankly _psyched_ that I’m not the tallest girl here anymore. Scratch that, the tallest _human person_ at the moment. Selena was hoping we wouldn’t get another tall-ass elf.” Este turns to Karlie and explains, “Selena’s the shortest one here. Her and Baby Haim.” 

“That’s me! Baby Haim, the artist formerly known as Alana.” Alana wrestles Pebbles back into her lap and nods at her sister. “This is Danielle.” 

The girl with the guitar raises a hand. She doesn’t wave or anything, just holds it up for a couple seconds before returning to her guitar. 

It’s late, so Este and her sisters show Karlie to her room — “Taylor aired it for you when Este called earlier, otherwise we’d be getting _way_ more eau de moth ball,” Alana assures her — and leave her to get settled. 

Karlie sits on the bed for a long time, looking at the pale floral wallpaper and the slanted ceiling, the white and pink duvet cover and white lace curtains. Next to the door hangs a framed black and white photo of four fluffy wolves sitting in the snow. Her whole body buzzes. The house smells — _something_. Like Este and Danielle and Alana smelled, something to do with firewood and pine needles and another note Karlie can’t quite place. 

The lady at the helpline was right. Karlie feels much better with a window full of swaying trees and midnight blue lake, fresh air seeping through the walls. 

“Pack,” Karlie whispers to herself, testing the word like bruised fruit at the supermarket. “Pack.” 

 

 

The wood stairs creak as Karlie makes her way downstairs.  Pale morning light pools in the country kitchen where a blonde girl with full lips and long legs whisks a bright yellow bowl of eggs. She looks up, startled, and then beams brighter than the sun. Karlie’s throat goes all funny, clogging or something.  

“You must be Karlie!” The girl puts the bowl down and immediately goes for a hug, enveloping Karlie in gangly arms and a mild, flowery scent. “Welcome to Swift River! I’m Taylor. It’s so nice to meet you.” 

 _Your eyes are really blue_ , Karlie thinks dumbly. “I really like your kitchen,” she says instead. 

“Oh, thank you so much,” Taylor says, and if it were anyone else Karlie thinks it’d sound insincere but Taylor seems genuinely delighted that Karlie likes the way her glass-fronted cabinets look with the white kitchen island. “I was just making some waffles. No one’s usually up this early but me.” 

“Oh — I could, like, did you want the time to yourself?” 

“No, no! Come here, have a seat. Try a raspberry.” Taylor pushes a glass bowl across the island towards Karlie. 

Karlie slides into one of the island seats and chooses the reddest, sloppiest berry. She half-closes her eyes at the sudden sweetness. “Wow, these are crazy good.” 

“ _Right_?” Taylor lights up with pride. “They’re the last of the season. I got Alana to row out to the island — no one picks out there, so there’s always fruit left. Go on, help yourself!” 

Karlie does so and Taylor bustles around the kitchen, unearthing pans and plates and spices and, finally, with a sly glance at Karlie, a massive packet of thick-cut bacon. “Wolves need their meat,” Taylor says, clocking the way Karlie immediately drools. 

“So that’s true? I didn’t —” Karlie twines her legs together, one over the other. “My family’s not, uh. Wolfblood. Like Este’s. I only know what I found on the internet.” 

Taylor puts the bacon down and looks Karlie right in the eye. Her eyes really are very, very blue. “You’ll need more meat now than you ever did before. Silver bullets won’t kill you. The werewolf laws are much laxer in New Hampshire and you don’t need to be registered; don’t listen to anybody who tells you different.” She lays one long hand over Karlie’s. “You won’t have to shift alone here. We can keep you safe until you know how to do it yourself.”

All of a sudden Karlie wants to confess everything to Taylor: her family’s weird silence, the cavernous feeling after she shifted, the day that her whole entire life changed forever. The crammed-full cupboard of _stuff_ in Karlie’s chest threatens to spill open in a sloppy spill of mess. 

Feet thunder down the stairs like a sudden infestation of deer. Karlie reluctantly pulls her hand away from Taylor’s and eats a few raspberries for something to do, forcing that overstuffed cupboard shut. 

“Yo, did I smell bacon?” asks Alana, hitting the island with enough force to throw her half over it. “I could eat, like, twelve pigs right now.” 

As people tumble down the stairs the kitchen fills up with a sudden onslaught of _smell_. It’s not unpleasant, like when Karlie’d visit a school friend who had a load of brothers overly fond of Axe Body Spray. She’s just acutely aware of every werewolf body filling the space, a smell like fumbling for a memory that only just eludes you. 

Twelve pigs for Alana aside, seven werewolves eat a _lot_. Taylor puts plate after plate on the dining table: fluffy waffles with maple syrup, glass bowls of sliced apples and raspberries, oval platters of thick bacon, scrambled eggs with hunks of sausage. They all ask Karlie so many questions she’s forced to explain around mouthfuls of meat how long she’s been a werewolf, if she’d known any wolves before, how the legislation is in Missouri, if she’s ever been kayaking, if she’s excited for the next full moon. 

Karlie manages to get a few questions in after everyone’s gorged themselves silly. Most of them are what Este called wolfbloods, born wolves: Taylor, the Haim girls, and Selena, who groans when Karlie stifles a laugh at her name. 

“My mom thought she was being so funny,” she complains, wrinkling her tiny nose. “At least she didn’t straight up name me Moon.” 

British token boy Harry was bitten as a child and thought he’d do university in New York City — “Idiot,” Alana tells him reflexively — and found it kind of challenging to wolf out in the concrete jungle. 

“I had to go to an internment center,” he whines, making tragic eyes. “They shut you up during the full moon in these cells with, like, a pile of leaves and a tree branch and half a chicken carcass.” 

“Poor lil baby,” Este says, chucking a toast triangle at his head. Harry doesn’t even try to catch it, just lets it bounce off his forehead onto the table and then throws it right back. 

“My first full moon was in the city,” Karlie confesses, and Harry jabs a sausage in her direction. 

“ _See_?” he demands, “I’m not the only one.” 

“But _Karlie_ had never shifted before,” Taylor says mildly, “You made a conscious choice to move, as a werewolf, to maybe the least werewolfy environment in all of North America.” 

“‘Cos I’m adventurous.” 

Este snorts. “Because you’re an idiot.” 

“ _Karlie_ isn’t judging me,” Harry whines, batting his big eyes in her direction like Karlie’s little sisters when they mean to suck up. 

“Karlie’s judging you a little bit,” Karlie says, and the whole table laughs. 

 

 

When Karlie was a kid, she’d heard stories about what werewolf packs got up to in their spare time and it was never about how they like to watch marathons of the Real Housewitches of Miami and eat ice cream in their pajamas. 

Taylor paints Karlie’s toenails carnation red one night, holding her ankle steady with her left hand. Karlie tunes out the Real Housewitches and Este’s honking laugh and stares down at Taylor’s steady strokes. It’s so easy to forget that Taylor’s bitten nails could grow into sharp claws at any moment, that a wolf bristles just inside her smooth skin. Karlie wonders what the news would say about them, if they knew there was a pack of wolves living in a former bed and breakfast in New Hampshire and they were watching reality tv and painting their nails and not terrorizing the populace at all. 

On some days Karlie fancies she can feel the wolf in herself too: darkness swirling beneath her breastbone, the power and the rage. _I am an animal_ , she thinks sometimes, standing barefoot by the lake as the leaves burn red. The raw howl of her sometimes presses against the inside of her ribcage, swelling and swelling until her eyes go yellow and her teeth grow long — and then it fades, and she just feels like Karlie Kloss from St Louis, Missouri again. 

Other than the werewolf thing, Karlie grew up with sisters, so living at Swift River feels almost like second nature. She expects the gigantic industrial boxes of tampons in the bathrooms and shameless oversharing, lax attitudes towards personal hygiene and nonsensical, byzantine inside jokes. Harry, surprisingly, doesn’t seem too bothered. 

“I grew up with just my mum and my sister,” he explains, dodging the bra Alana has just hurled from her body like an unwanted spider. “This is pretty normal for me.” 

Karlie is so wrapped up in Swift River that when Taylor suggests she go to town for supplies, the reminder of the real world feels like a cold splash of lake water on her face. 

“Selena can’t go alone,” Taylor says, fingers-deep in bread dough. 

“Why not?” 

“We’re not the only wolf pack in New Hampshire.” 

Karlie wants to say that Taylor is being unnecessarily withholding, but she must have her own reasons. So she swipes a bit of dough to sample, flicks a bit of flour at Taylor’s perfect hair and obediently goes off to meet Selena out front. 

The little Volkswagen feels surprisingly roomy and Karlie only has to tuck her legs up a little bit to fit inside. It’s a half hour to the big Hannaford and Selena drives fast, singing loudly to pop music and pelting Karlie with empty straw wrappers until she joins in. 

The shopping center looks like a white weatherboard strip mall. Selena pulls into a parking space wildly off-center and shrugs. “No one’s here anyway,” she says, and puts the car in park.  

That seems to be the case until the entrance hits them with a wave of foreign smells, and something traveling under the sterile air conditioning that stings, feels _wrong_ somehow in a way Karlie doesn’t have words for.

“Do you smell something weird?” Karlie sniffs experimentally. _Eugh_. She claps her hand over her nose and mouth. 

 Selena’s eyes flash yellow and she growls, low in her throat. 

Karlie’s nose goes itchy and she turns left and right to try and route out the source.  “What _is_ that?” 

Selena doesn’t answer. She balls her long cardigan sleeves up in her fists and stalks through the store and up into the baking aisle, shoulders quivering. Karlie stumbles keeping up. 

A tall guy with a baseball cap and a woman in a plaid shirt freeze where they’d been tossing bags of chocolate chips over the heaps of meat in their shopping cart. The guy slowly looks over his shoulder at Karlie and Selena. He’s older than they are, maybe thirty, thirty-five.  

“Oh hey,” he says, shifting. “New girl?” 

“Oh _hey_? This is _our territory_ ,” Selena snaps, her teeth going long and sharp. She’s eight inches shorter than Karlie and has a baby face with sweet soft cheeks that makes old ladies coo and ask how she’s liking ninth grade but in that moment she’s older, fiercer. Stronger. Karlie’s blood thrums like Selena’s, a faint echo of _almost pack_. The other wolves sprout overlong canines right back at them. Chocolate chips spill out over the lino; the woman has ripped the plastic bag with her claws. 

A middle-aged woman pulls her son away from the cake mixes and bustles him towards the exit, looking back at them nervously.  

“We’ve missed you around our place,” the guy says. “Sorry to hear about —”

“We had an agreement, Turner.” Selena ignores Karlie’s hand on her shoulder. “Taylor lets you have the Shopping Center on Thursdays and Fridays, tú entiendes? What day is it?” 

“Monday,” mutters Turner. “Listen, girls, when you run out of food, you run out of food. What do you expect us to do?” 

“Uh, _wait_ ,” says Selena, but she’s looking less certain now. “Go to another place?” 

“Can I help you?” A woman in a red Hannaford shirt smiles nervously. “I’m sorry, but we have a no territorial disputes in the store policy. You’ll have to go outside.”

“We’re shopping,” snaps Turner. His eyes glint yellow. “We have a full cart here.”  

“I’m sorry to hear that, but one or both of you needs to leave now. Store policy. Unless your pack wants… to get banned.” The woman says the last bit like she’s lost a bet to come and deal with them, which she probably has. She looks terrified. 

“It’s okay,” Karlie says hurriedly, glancing at the woman’s name-tag. “I’m really sorry, Martha. Just a misunderstanding. We’ll come back later, won’t we, Selena?” 

“Justin says hi,” Turner drawls, and Selena growls, trying to wrench her way out of Karlie’s grip. 

“We’ll just — I’m really sorry, it won’t happen again.” Karlie gets Selena more firmly by the back of the cardigan and pulls her out of the store, glancing apologetically back at Martha. She hopes those other wolves will have to clean up the spilled chocolate chips. 

It feels like the temperature’s dropped by ten degrees when they get outside. Karlie pulls her hoodie closer to her body. “Okay. Grocery fights! New and different.” 

Now that Selena’s wolf has receded she looks about twelve years old, sniffling into the sleeve of her cardigan. “That _stupid pack_ , god. They never listen to me. It’s our _territory_. They’re meant to respect that!” 

Karlie glances back at the shop and summons a reassuring smile. “There has to be another grocery store around here, right?” 

“There’s a Valuland in Bartlett,” Selena says, wiping her nose. 

“Okay, let’s try that. It’s not so bad, right?” 

Selena shrugs and slinks off to the car like a spurned puppy, Karlie trailing in her miserable wake. 

When Karlie’s sisters had bad days, Karlie would make them Easy Mac and sing Kesha songs at them until they felt better. She does the best she can with Selena, distracting her with a made-up dance to Timber in the car on their way to the Valuland, then adding the Easy Mac boxes to their cart as soon as they hit the pasta aisle. By the time they cross the town border into Scythe, Selena’s laughing again, shimmying and tossing her hair. 

As soon as they pull into the drive Selena stops singing. Her shoulders rise up towards her ears and she pulls her lower lip through her teeth, over and over until it’s red.

“You want me to tell Taylor?” asks Karlie, nudging Selena with her elbow. 

“Would you?” Selena’s shoulders relax and she takes a long breath. “She’s not going to be mad at you or anything, it’s just… I have a history with that pack. They never… Whatever. I owe you one.”  

Selena transports plastic bags of groceries from the car to the porch and leaves it to Karlie to get them from the front door to the kitchen. Taylor takes the heaviest bags and as she does Karlie explains everything, stuttering through the bits she doesn’t quite understand — why it hit Selena so much worse than her, why Selena smelled _weird_ for a good fifteen minutes after they left the Hannaford, the whole custody system with the Hannaford — and doing her best to describe the other werewolves. 

“Turner, that was it,” Karlie remembers in a rush. “Baseball cap, brown hair. Standard bro?” She puts the eggs on a shelf in the fridge instead of into the rack on the door, like her mom always told her to do. 

“Eugh.” Taylor makes a face. “The Ossippi Pack. Figures.” 

The Haim girls look up from where they’d been drumming with chopsticks on cabinets and jars. “I hate those guys,” Alana announces. 

“Time to mark some territory?” asks Este, and then drums,“ _T-t-territory. T-t-territyory_.” 

“ _Gross_ ,” howls Alana, with a quick rat-a-tat on the sugar jar. 

“Do you actually have to —” Karlie stops herself, trying to think of a less condemnatory way to phrase it. “You know, like dogs…” 

Danielle cracks a smile, glancing amused up at her. 

“Pee everywhere?” Taylor asks dryly, “Yeah, actually.”

“My life has changed in lots of ways,” Karlie says.

At first she’s just amused, thinking about all of them running around like puppies, lifting their legs on trees and rocks. But — Karlie’s only gone wolf on the full moon. Selena fully sprouted claws at the Hannaford and Karlie just felt irritable. Sometimes she’ll wake up from a nightmare with sharp fingernails or finish a run with her eyes flashing yellow, but she’s never managed to do a transition on her own. The thought rankles. As soon as she gets a minute, Karlie is going to raid the little library in the living room and learn everything in the world about wolves and werewolves and wolfbloods. The Internet didn’t tell her about all the peeing, so what else could it have missed out on? 

“Should I…” She swallows, turning to restock the cereal cabinet. “Should I come too? I know I’m not, uh. _Pack_.” 

“Yet,” Taylor corrects her, with a warm hand on Karlie’s lower back. “I mean, if you want. It’s not mandatory.” 

“I want,” Karlie says immediately. Taylor smiles at her, an intimate little quirk of her full lips. 

“Then you should come too. It’s not as effective until we all run together — the full moon isn’t for another two weeks — but it definitely wouldn’t hurt. Besides, you should know our borders.” 

Karlie winces in advance. “I’ve never — I mean, not that I _can’t_ , but I haven’t, like, totally wolfed out on my own yet. Besides the last full moon. So.” 

“No, you wouldn’t have,” Taylor says, unsurprised. She looks at Karlie’s total lack of comprehension and then does a double take. “Woah, the Internet is clearly slacking here: new wolves take a few moons for at-will shifts. You’re still a puppy, technically.” 

Karlie doesn’t know if she should find that cute or not. The Haim girls definitely do, they _awww_ in harmony. 

Alana laughs, nearly falling off her chair. “Anyway, we have SheWees!” 

Karlie glances at Danielle, who shrugs and goes back to drumming on the lid of the trashcan. 

“The locals don’t, like, _love it_ when we wolf out over primo tourist areas during leaf peeping season,” Este informs her. “Big bad wolves are bad for business.” 

“We’re one of the few packs with a good relationship with the neighbors. Uh, fingers crossed.” Taylor crosses her long fingers and then knocks on some wood, like she’s trying to layer up the good luck in all directions. “It’s been a family priority for generations. Frankly, the newer packs are fucking with our chill.” 

“So we pee on stuff?” Karlie can’t quite get over the SheWee concept, or the giggles, which are erupting sort of through her nose in really cool, really suave snorting pattern. 

“We live the glam life,” Taylor deadpans. 

The next day everyone sets off to, as Taylor said, pee everywhere. They set off in two pairs and one trio, everyone armed with a giant bottle of water and a SheWee, except for their token boy. 

“I feel so left out,” Harry says, piling into the truck after Karlie so Taylor can drive them to the north edge of their territory. 

“Well, I want to be paid an equal wage for the same work,” Taylor says, starting the pickup. “Life is full of hardships.” 

Karlie examines her SheWee with barely contained giggles. She got a blue one. It looks sort of like a pastel sieve. Taylor’s is pink and has its own holster. 

“If you want, I can call in reinforcement,” Harry says. He’s been hanging his head out the window like a happy dog, letting his hair whip into his eyes. “Nick’s back in America soon.” 

“I’ll think about it,” Taylor says, taking a careful left. She drives more carefully than Este and Selena, and makes everyone wear seat-belts even though this is New Hampshire, and they don’t necessarily have to. 

Taylor parks at a trailhead some fifteen miles north of the house and they begin at the edge of the river, marking territory at uneven intervals. The SheWee takes some adjustment but after a few goes Karlie’s sort of guiltily enjoying it. The experience is hilarious but also somewhat visceral, primal; maybe it’s the wolf in her. She should try chewing on some sneakers, see if she loves it. 

They work backwards, hiking up into the mountains, avoiding populated trails. Karlie has never been much of a hiker but she finds it easy to keep up and satisfying, clambering over rocks and trying to identify the trees by name. 

“Someday this will all be yours,” Harry quotes in a rumbly voice when they reach a rock slab outlook. Hardy weeds grow through the cracks in the slate and blue purple mountains stretch out for miles and miles. 

Taylor laughs. She gets an arm around Karlie’s waist and leads her to the south edge of the rock. 

“Everywhere the light touches, Simba,” Taylor jokes, gesturing to the rolling hills and lakes below them. “Or, everywhere south of the Swift River and north of those mountains over there.” 

Karlie makes a mental note to find out how far back Taylor’s family goes here, exactly. 

Harry ambles off into the trees unzipping his jeans and humming the Lion King. 

“It’s beautiful here,” Karlie says softly. She can hear waterfalls and the rustling of pine trees, hikers some half mile off and squirrels rustling in the trees. The air swells in her lungs. 

Taylor points out the blue blotch that is Scythe Lake and beyond that, the cluster of mountains that mark the territory of the Ossipee Pack. Somewhere in between those markers, the rest of the pack are bounding through the woods and towns in wolf form or wielding SheWees, doing their best to thicken the border the only way they know how. 

“That pack is pushing up against us,” Taylor says, “They used to live down by Lake Winnipesaukee but it’s too popular now. Summer people.” She absently gnaws on her thumbnail, seemingly not noticing that she still has Karlie tucked up against her with one arm. “My parents think we ought to go north, like they did.” 

“What do you think?” 

“I don’t want to,” Taylor says immediately. “This is our home. I don’t want to give it up.” 

“Then we won’t,” Karlie says, and Taylor’s arm tightens around her hips. Karlie memorizes the warmth of it, the smell of Taylor’s hair, the way it feels to be held like it’s second nature. 

 

 

As the moon waxes in the wide sky, everyone gets tetchier. They crave more meat; they can’t sit still for long. Karlie dreams of weak deer and lame elk and the sweet iron scent of blood. She wakes up restless and hungry. 

To distract herself, Karlie goes for sweaty runs around the lake. Sometimes Harry joins her, huffing as he tries to keep up and Karlie cackles, racing ahead. She’s the tallest in the house and the fastest, her legs long enough to lap anyone who tries to compete. The only one who really tries is Taylor, who hates running but loves to trash talk her until Karlie sprints away crowing her victory to the rustling woods as Taylor laughs and claps. 

Karlie notices that whatever’s turning them all into prickly beasts doesn’t seem to be doing much to Taylor. 

“It’s sort of wolfy PMS,” Este tells her, “It hits all of us differently. You know, like Danielle gets really talkative.” 

Danielle, who has said exactly three words since lunch, rolls her eyes. 

Harry spends a lot of time locked in his bedroom with his laptop. Karlie thinks it best she doesn’t listen too hard as she passes his door. She does chuck handfuls of tissues at him whenever he emerges, though. She’s never had a little brother and feels that the best way to handle them is by frequent bouts of being really, really annoying. 

Alana and Este get the munchies. They walk around with bags of tortilla chips and cook hamburgers at night. Alana teaches Karlie how to make a brownie in a mug, and then mimes gagging into the sink when Karlie wants to make a healthy version. “Brownies are _not meant_ to be healthy, Kloss,” she says firmly, and yanks the mug right out of her hand before Karlie can get a word in about almond flour. 

Selena huddles next to the phone in the study and cries a lot. When the Haim girls and Karlie sit out on the porch they can hear her through the window, talking to someone and sniffling. Este says she’s had a bad breakup recently. “He was, pardon my French, un _extreme penis_.” 

Alana nods. “I thought Taylor was going to make wind-chimes out of his ribcage.” 

Este shakes her head sadly and rewinds her enormous scarf around her neck. “I am so disappointed that did not happen.”  

“He’s in the pack by Ossipee Lake. Real bag of dicks, as you will recall.” Alana makes a jerk-off motion with her hand. 

“Mm-hm. Aloonie’s got that one right. Bag-oh-dicks. Reach into that bag, you keep pulling out dicks. Like, smelly, cheesy dicks.” 

“Gross,” Karlie says, screwing up her face. 

“You think the bag is out of dicks, and then it isn’t! Dicks keep on coming. Smelly, unclean, probably with some sort of fungus. Ain’t that the way with dicks.” 

“Okay, E. That’s enough dick talk,” says Alana, talking with her mouth full. 

“I’m diverting my love of dick with dick disgust. It’s like avoidance therapy. You should slap me every time I say penis.” Este grabs the bag of chips from her sister and settles back in her chair. 

“We’d have to slap you five times an hour on average,” Alana points out. 

“That’s the price I pay for peen,” Este says nobly. 

“Well then I’m glad I’m not into, uh. Penis.” Karlie flushes and looks away towards the lake, trying to tamp down the reflex to start laughing at the word. 

Alana and Este don’t hold back, snickering into their shoulders and kicking out at Karlie’s sneakers. “Our little Klossy grows up so fast,” Alana says, like she’s more than a year older than Karlie. 

“Miss Teen America says the p-word,” Este marvels. The screen door opens and Karlie jumps, until she realizes it’s just Danielle coming back from the bathroom. Este waves her over. “Hey, Danielle! Karlie here said _penis._ ” 

Danielle nods in an impressed sort of way and sits on the steps near them. 

“Penis brings us all together,” jokes Alana, “Except Karlie. Wise choice, Karlo.” 

“Do you — uh, do you know if…” Karlie bites her thumbnail and shuts up. It’s none of her business. It doesn’t matter, anyway, it’s not like anything’s going to happen. 

“Miss Tay partakes of the pussay?” 

“Este!” Karlie hides her face behind one hand, insides squirming. Alana shrieks in hysterics, thumping her thigh rhythmically.

“Sorry, I meant, participates in chaste romantic hand holding with the fairer sex.” Este eyes Alana, who has nearly started crying with laughter, and keeps going. “I meant, occasionally escorts a lady to the country fair. Spends the odd evening dancing by candlelight with —”

“Taylor’s bi,” Danielle says, before Este can get into the dramatics. Well, farther into the dramatics. 

Karlie pretends to be very interested in the foliage. It’s not hard to do: the lake in autumn is astoundingly gorgeous. No wonder there are so many tourists driving up through the mountains. “Cool,” she says weakly. 

“ _Cool_ ,” echo Este and Alana, snickering. 

 

 

The full moon finally hits on a Saturday and everyone trembles with anticipation until nightfall.  

“It’s the Hunter’s Moon,” Danielle mentions, and Karlie tries to hide how thrilled she is that Danielle spoke to her twice in three days. 

The wolfbloods know all this stuff like Karlie knows her ABCs. Each moon has a name: Rose Moon, Thunder Moon, Red Moon; names coined for wolves and farmers, country people and witches. Karlie became a wolf in the orange glow of a Harvest Moon, and she’ll run with a pack for the first time under a Hunter’s Moon: a long night in the wild, with a wide bright sky and no fear of concrete or sirens. Karlie grins. “Are we the prey, or are we the humans?” 

It feels strange to think of humans as _not them_ , like she’s one of the rogue werewolves in Fox News’s sensationalist scare stories. 

“Does it matter?” Danielle smiles through her hair. “We’re hunters too.” 

 

 

Karlie wakes up euphoric. For a moment, she can’t remember where she is and then it all comes at her in this rush: thick pine underneath her bare skin, steel grey sky above and the sound of a stream bubbling less than half a mile off. She sits up gingerly, rotating her shoulders as they crack. Her muscles ache like the day after a good workout. 

“Good morning,” says Taylor, and Karlie freezes. 

Taylor’s as naked as she is: a long pale body nestled in brown and dark green, small round breasts with upturned nipples, her hair fluffy and sporting a few dried leaves. Karlie doesn’t know where to look. 

Taylor doesn’t seem to have that problem. “You have really great abs,” she says absently, looking right at them. 

Karlie looks down at her stomach. “Thanks, I like — yours?” _What_? 

Taylor snorts, stifling her laugh behind one hand. Karlie can’t help but laugh, too, and then they’re both falling into the leaves laughing hard enough their ribs shake. Karlie wipes tears from her cheeks as she calms down, still trying not to stare blatantly at Taylor’s chest or the curve of her hip. 

“So, uh. Where are the others?” 

Taylor plucks leaves from her messy hair, combing it as best she can into a semblance of order. “Most of them are closer to the house,” she says. “Can’t you feel?” 

“Feel what?” 

Taylor stands up in one long stretch of tanned skin and white patches the sun has never seen, but now Karlie has. “Stand up. It’s time for a wolf lesson.” 

Karlie pulls herself to her feet and walks haltingly towards Taylor, her heart beating a heavy drum in her chest. She gets the shivers like she’s chugging a Big Gulp Slurpee. 

“Close your eyes.” 

Unthinkingly, Karlie obeys. 

“Okay, do some yoga breathing. In through the nose and out through the mouth. Good girl.” 

Someday Karlie is going to examine what it means that those two words together when coming from Taylor makes her want to, like, roll over or something. 

“Now feel the pine needles under your toes, the ground around you. You know where you are. You can hear the stream. You can smell the trees. We all ran together last night, Karlie. We’re connected now. You know that, right? You can feel it — right below your heart. Like a string leading in every direction.” 

To be honest, Karlie’s string is going right to Taylor. She can barely notice anything else.

“Feel the strings now. I’m right in front of you, but where are the others? Are they far away?” 

“No,” Karlie says, without fully understanding how she knows. “Danielle is alone by the lake. Este and Alana are in the woods near Deer River. They’re moving east, towards — oh, they just found Selena. They’re on the north side of the house. Harry’s at the house too, on the south side, he’s — how do I _know_ this?” Karlie opens her eyes too fast and the light hits her funny, bouncing around between her and Taylor until all she can see is Taylor’s pink lips and blue, blue eyes.

“Instinct,” Taylor says, and pulls a leaf from Karlie’s hair. “Cool, right? C’mon, let’s go back to the house. We have a visitor.” 

Karlie blinks, watching Taylor’s swaying hips and then jolts forward. “Visitor?” 

Karlie can smell him before she can see him: rich woody cologne and hair product mixed with the same pack aroma that binds them all together.  

Up ahead in front of the house, Harry is bounding around the newcomer like a puppy. If he had a tail he’d be wagging it, but as it is the only thing that’s wagging is his dick, which — Karlie stops at the edge of the trees. 

“ _Taylor_! I’m _nude_!” 

Taylor turns back and laughs. “I know, babe. We all are.” 

“No, I mean, I don’t _know_ that guy!” Karlie tries to cover up her breasts with one arm. Maybe she can find a big leaf to go over her crotch, like a really tall Eve. 

“Don’t worry, Nick’s only got eyes for Harry anyway.” Taylor wraps an arm around Karlie’s waist and neatly short-circuits every wire in Karlie’s brain. Her arm is warm and soft and Karlie can feel Taylor’s body press into the curves of hers. “Let’s go get some jeans, babe. I’ve got you.” Taylor hides them partially behind a white ash tree and hollers, “Hey Grimshaw! Styles! Avert your eyes, you’ve got ladies coming through!” 

Harry and the visitor obligingly face the lake, waving backwards as Karlie and Taylor come rushing up the lawn from the trees. 

“Now we’ll never know if you have a bellybutton,” says Harry. 

Karlie goes about the color of the pickup truck as she says a perfunctory hello and ducks past Harry and his friend to get inside. 

“Ooooh,” she can hear the visitor say in an accent just like Harry’s, “Taylor has a new lady!” 

Karlie tactfully ignores that as she bounds upstairs. 

When she comes back down again it’s like it hadn’t happened — whatever that was in the woods with her and Taylor, the crackling air between them and the way Taylor had led her proprietarily through the garden. Everyone’s sprawled around the living room. They’ve all found clothes except, apparently, Harry, who’s only wearing black boxer briefs and looking extremely smug. He sprawls half over the sofa, watching the visitor with a greedy, preening sort of gaze. Karlie rolls her eyes. 

“I know,” Este says, “He’s disgusting. Harry, you are disgusting.” 

Karlie glances at the back of Taylor’s neck, vulnerable under the wisps of her messy bun. “Yeah,” she says. “Disgusting.” 

 

 

The visitor is called Nick. He’s English like Harry, he’s even taller than Karlie and he’s a witch. It’s almost Halloween and Taylor has sent the two of them and Harry out to the garden to get pumpkins for carving. She planted a whole bunch over the summer and they’ve spilled out of their raised beds to greedily colonize half the ground. Karlie’s impressed at the great orange swells of them, how easily they swamped and spread and grew. Harry seems more interested in a funny-looking duck at the edge of the lake. 

“Where do you live most of the time? New York?” 

“Generally I reside in Ye Olde London-town but I can’t resist a wolf in distress,” Nick informs her, kneeling to inspect a gourd. 

“What kind of magic do you do?” 

“Mostly potions, small charms and such. Enough to keep me out of the Big Trouble and in the finest Topman has to offer.” Nick laughs. Nick laughs all the time, but mostly at himself. 

Karlie sets a good-sized pumpkin off to the side and continues hunting through the vines. She knows Taylor will want the most perfectly round specimens, but she’ll also have a soft spot for the funny-looking little ones. “How long have you known Harry?” 

“Nick met me right after I was turned,” Harry says, loudly from the lake, and Karlie startles. She hadn’t realized he’d been listening. 

“You should tell the story, Haz.” Nick adds a pumpkin to Karlie’s collection. “I bet little Klossy here is dying to hear it.” 

She is, but she’s too polite to just _ask_. That seems a bit mean, really. What if it’s a bad memory? “You don’t have to,” Karlie says. 

“I don’t mind,” Harry says, and hikes over to them. 

“This might take a while,” Nick warns her, with a fond glance at Harry who has bent down to inspect a lopsided miniature pumpkin. 

“I was twelve. I lived in this village that was pretty rural. Lots of dairy farms around, that sort of thing. Anyway, one night I said I’d meet this girl I liked. We thought we were being, like, proper rebellious. Took off on our bicycles at about ten at night and went to meet down by this stream. She chickened out last minute, though, so I was waiting down by this stream, wondering why she was so late. I dunno if I had a phone yet. I think I did.” Harry picks the little pumpkin off the vine and tosses it up like he’s about to juggle. “I heard some, like. Rustling in the woods. I don’t remember much of what happened next, but I got bit and had the fever. In the morning I was a werewolf.” Harry shrugs. “I guess it’s not an unusual story.” 

“What did your mom say?” 

“She was great, really accepting. My sister was pretty freaked out at first but she got used to it, I guess. Mum went to a support group for, uh, mums of supernaturally oriented teens or whatever. She met Nick’s sister there.” 

Nick nods. “Janie was always trying to get Eileen to come along but she never would. _Bunch of rubbish_ , she’d say. _I’m too busy for that_.” 

Karlie wonders if they have those support groups in Missouri. She stacks another pumpkin and counts their stems. Enough to go back in, probably, but she’s not ready to face everyone else. She chews on her lower lip. “It’s different for wolfbloods, isn’t it?” 

“I think about it, like, it’s different for people who live in New Hampshire and people who live in London,” Harry says, squinting at the bright sky where a knot of sparrows are flying south. “It’s different for people who are left handed and right handed. It’s different, but it’s not, like, _worse_.” 

Nick flicks Harry’s ear. “The family thing can be worse, Saint Harold, Patron Saint of Yoga.”

“I just mean, you have to… adapt. It doesn’t change who you _are_ , it just changes the circumstances, like, surrounding your life.” 

Karlie runs that over in her mind like a smooth skipping stone. It’s different for wolfbloods, but it’s also different for men. Karlie was a girl who walked home alone at night. She was the start of every procedural, the punchline to every mystery story. A girl walked home alone at night; there was a monster; there was blood, and it was hers. 

 

 

“I just don’t see why we can’t just shift and _run_ ,” Alana whines. They’re hauling battered summer bicycles out of the shed and pumping up the neglected tires, trying to fob off the children’s bikes on Selena and Alana, who are the shortest. 

Karlie flushes. “I don’t mind, if you guys want to. I could bike and you guys could run; I swear I don’t mind.” 

“Absolutely not,” Taylor says, wrapping an arm around Karlie’s waist and squeezing. “All for one and one for all. Sisterhood!” Taylor’s giggly from the pre-gaming they’ve done in the kitchen, and she’s touching Karlie more after every sip of mixed drink. God, Karlie feels like she might crawl out of her own skin. Taylor smells like sweet vanilla soy latte and skin. She leans into her warmth as discreetly as she can manage, which is probably not very.  

“Sisterhood!” Nick raises his water bottle filled with gin and tonic towards them, beaming with all his teeth on show. “Plus, I can’t wolf out either. And also, _brr_.” 

“Aren’t you using a warming charm or summat?” Harry gropes Nick under his heavy parka, and Nick bats him off, giggling. 

“It’s going to take us forty-nine years to get there,” Danielle mumbles. “Why can’t we just stay here, again?” 

“Because of _entertainment_ and also the bartender will pine.” Este kicks the gear of her bicycle for no discernible reason. “And it’s Saturday! It’s DJ Jammin’ Jeff!” 

“DJ Jammin’ Jeff hates me,” Alana says sadly. 

“Because you requested Bye Bye Bye about forty times in one night,” Selena laughs. She’s been ready to go for ages: perched on a faded lavender kids bike with a basket strapped to the handlebars. 

They eventually manage to get rolling: seven werewolves and a warlock balanced precariously on ancient bicycles with about five bike lights between them and no street lights as far as they can see. Everyone’s too giggly to care about biking fast and Taylor keeps pace right next to Karlie, shouting jokes over the wind and the sound of Selena leading everyone in a boy band medley. 

The main street is dark and deserted at ten PM and they cycle past lines of darkened windows and shuttered houses until they spot a neon sign in the window of a building wedged between a Chinese restaurant and a gas station. B-A-R in flickering red lights. They lean their bikes up against the side of the building, nary a lock in sight. 

“No one will steal them,” Selena says. 

“Because of community spirit!” Taylor dumps her bike gracelessly over Karlie’s. 

“Because all our bicycles are shit,” Harry substitutes cheerfully. 

“How I missed Bar,” Nick declares, gesturing grandly at the gravel parking lot and lit-up window. “Bar, the only nighttime establishment in this corner of New Hampshire.” 

“Ah, Bar,” Este says rapturously, “My spiritual home.” 

Este’s spiritual home has a thumping DJ booth, absolutely zero functional overhead lights and tiling that was once black and white, now a sort of off-brown and cream. 

Karlie wrinkles her nose. “Your spiritual home smells… really bad.”  

“Yeah, they moved the smoking section to the pool room but it hasn’t… really taken.” Este shrugs. “Change is hard, dude.” 

A toothless middle-aged man leers in Karlie’s direction, opening his mouth half-way to say something that will, probably, be vile. Karlie pretends to be fascinated by the drinks menu, but before she can really brace herself Taylor leans over and growls at him — literally growls, with yellow-flashing eyes and big teeth. 

The man mumbles something that sounds like _sorry_ and backs off further down the bar. 

Taylor’s growl lights something up in Karlie, something with hot blood and a beating heart and all of a sudden she feels so strong she could drop kick any old leering dude into Vermont. A flash of teeth and yellow eye and she could get anyone to back off, any of these pale silvers of male faces with eyes like grasping hands. She sits up straighter, feeling every one of her seventy-two inches. Karlie thinks about the phrase _a wolf in sheep’s clothing_ and she thinks that they are all just wolves in mascara, wolves in ballet flats and there is a wolf in every woman’s heart because there has to be, to be a woman and to live in this world. 

“The Swift River Pack is back,” laughs the bartender, a woman with cherry red hair and a nose piercing. “I missed you girls.” 

“And token boy,” Harry reminds her, with his little shit grin. 

“And _trouble_ ,” says the bartender. 

“And Grimmy!” says Nick, immediately chatting away to the bartender like long lost siblings. 

“Come here often?” Karlie elbows Taylor gently. 

“Bar is literally the only thing to do here after hours,” Taylor tells her, reaching over the bar for an abandoned Ketel One. “I mean, if you don’t count the 7-11, or arson. Estelle and I go back.”

“Go back?” Karlie frowns and passes Taylor the soda to mix. “Like… Go _back_?” 

Taylor shrieks with laughter. “Oh my god, she was my babysitter, not like _that_.”  

“This place is only tolerable if you’re wasted,” Danielle notes, eying the bar suspiciously. “Pass the vodka.” 

The drinks go down bitter and the music beats harder with each bass drop. Nick and Harry are dirty dancing on the empty dance floor after two vodka tonics, handsy and grinding and making grizzly old men eye them with subtle disapproval that they hide whenever Taylor looks their way. 

Karlie figures they must all know what they are, under their human skin. All tooth and pulsing muscle, all claws and lethal blood. It feels good to be a predator. It feels good to have them fear her. In her old life she was prey, a lanky gazelle walking home after ballet class, a target right between her shoulder-blades. Strange how in the span of five minutes a girl can go from prey to predator, from bitten to biter, from soft to razor sharp. In the daylight she doesn’t want to be, doesn’t want to think of herself the way the newscasters do — _werewolves gone feral_ , that sort of thing — but now, at night, she does, she _does_ feel feral. 

She’s maybe a little drunk. 

“I’m dancing. You dancing?” Taylor’s arm is around her neck, her t-shirt sweaty and warm. 

“This is definitely not ballet,” Karlie says, laughing, imagining doing fouettés to the sick beat of Lil Jon. Shots, shots, plié! She’s so different now, and the exact same, and it’s all muddled up in her sloshing head. Taylor is beautiful in the black light, the curve of her full lips red as blood, her skin as white as snow. Taylor’s good at words and Karlie isn’t, but if she were she’d write her ballads, poems and pop songs. 

“It can be if you want it to be!” Taylor leads her to the dance floor and does the clumsiest pirouette Karlie has ever seen. “ _Parkour,_ ” she whispers, grasping Karlie’s face in both hands. 

Karlie loses it, laughing so hard her stomach aches and soon they’re dancing, arms flung in the air and feet moving in every direction.  There’s something about girls dancing in a heaving circle, legs woven together and blocking out any errant men, something sparkly and magical and sweaty and _fun_ , something bright that sends bubbling champagne euphoria through Karlie’s bloodstream to fizz to the tips of her aching toes. The black light tinges their faces violet and distills Karlie’s world to these bodies, this floor, her _pack_ interpretive dancing to Ke$ha and laughing hard enough to wrench tears from their eyes. Taylor grasps her hand tight and raises them up together, like a victory march. It could just be the Ketel One, but man, Karlie feels victorious.

It’s all shining disco shards of light and pulsating beat and Alana dashing over to the DJ to request “just one more, just one more thing,” which is why it’s so surprising when Taylor stops short. “Are you _fucking_ kidding me,” she say-shouts, darting shark eyes towards the entrance. 

“What?” Karlie looks after her. The doors are silent, shut, nothing — _oh_. 

The smell hits her first: that _wrong_ smell like at the Hannaford before her first pack moon, only it’s heightened now; she can feel the razor smell of it grating against her bones. Then she sees them: five boys in snapbacks and distressed jackets, two girls with teased hair. Like they’re one, the whole pack bares their teeth and growls low. The Ossipee Pack growls right back. 

Everyone in the bar has stopped chatting, dancing, drinking. Even the DJ has stopped mixing to watch the two packs glare at each other over the suddenly vacant dance floor. 

“It’s like a very toothy West Side Story,” she hears Nick say, faint like a voice through a tunnel. She can hear him laugh nervously, hear him rush over to the bartender. 

“Okay kids, outside, outside,” says Estelle the bartender, flapping a hand towel at the boys in the doorway, ushering them outside. “You too, girls. Gotta work that out between yourselves.” 

Karlie glances at Taylor who nods, like, _nothing we can do_ , and follows her out into the chilly night. 

A baby-faced boy with swagger too big for his frame nods at them. “‘Sup, Selena?” 

“Fuck right off,” Este snaps, even as Selena’s face crumples into something Karlie hasn’t seen since the moon waxed full. 

“Leave it, Justin,” says an older guy, pushing Justin behind him. “Listen, Swift. We didn’t know you were going to be here.” 

“It’s our territory, Jason.” 

“Technically, but the towns are sort of fair game, yeah? Not like we can choose where the bars are.” 

“There are bars in _your_ territory, you know.”

“We fancied this one.” Jason smiles a lopsided, smug little grin, all _boys will be boys_. 

Taylor doesn’t smile back. She stands tall, all angular shoulders and unwavering gaze. “Tough luck,” she says flatly. 

Silence stretches in the space between packs like a rubber band pulled taut, reverberating a little with the faint unz-unz from Bar’s closed doors. Nick is pressed up against the side of Bar, Harry penning him against the panels as his eyes flash yellow in the faint light. Taylor’s halfway to wolf at this point and most of the others aren’t any better. Karlie can feel every pump of hot blood in her veins but she can’t access the change she’s read about, the sort of blood hook that allows mature werewolves to change at will. If there’s going to be a fight, she’s not going to be able to go in as a wolf. 

It feels like hours, but it’s probably only minutes before the Ossipee Pack backs away grumbling. They pile into their trucks and rev off into the night. 

“Next time, Swift,” Jason shouts out over the sound, “Next time!” 

 

 

November is off season in New Hampshire. The last of the out-of-state plates fade away and the rental houses close, visited only by a cleaner once or twice a month. Scythe goes pond-quiet and Karlie can hear birds overhead, smell the pine. The Ossipee Pack presses up against their borders and Nick has started to make sounds about reinforcing their territorial marking, something about power amplification. 

The Beaver Moon rises and passes with extensive giggling, and as Thanksgiving dawns Karlie spends a lot of time staring at her phone. The last text she sent to her mother says only _I’m safe_. There’s no response. She tries to keep busy cleaning the house for their upcoming visitors. 

“There’s _just_ enough room for everyone,” Taylor says anxiously, patting the pillow down in her brother’s old room. “I want my parents to see that we’re doing okay. They’re really getting on my back about territory.” 

Karlie passes her a thick folded blanket. It smells of cotton and mothballs. “Did you tell them about Bar?” 

“Unfortunately.” Taylor wrinkles her little nose and Karlie barely resists the urge to kiss it. “They aren’t wild about wolfbloods drinking in general, so you can imagine how _thrilled_ they were to hear we dealt with a territory dispute drunk.”

Karlie thinks about how the vodka seemed to burn off in the cold night, but figures that tactic wouldn’t really please Mama and Papa Swift. “You’re doing a great job as pack leader, Tay. I don’t care what your parents think.” 

“Thanks,” Taylor says, her small smile warm. “Luckily the Ossipee Pack will be too busy with _their_ families to pull anything stupid when my parents are here. I mean, I hope. Jason’s mom was always a real ball-buster at the PTA.” 

The next day two pickup trucks and a great big van roar into their driveway and people pile out: Taylor’s mom and dad and her little brother; the parents Haim, hip in seventies throwback clothes; Selena’s young mom and dad and stepdad; a bundle of aunts and uncles and cousins who seem to belong to all of them equally. The Swift River pack run out towards them with shrieks of glee, the Haim sisters descending on their parents like a pack of joyous jackals. Taylor’s crying a little in her mom’s arms. 

Karlie misses her family like oxygen underwater. 

Nick wraps an arm around Karlie’s shoulders, the only person in the house who stands even taller than she does. “Klossy, I have a very serious confession. I don’t understand Thanksgiving at all.”

Wiping her watery eyes, Karlie sticks an elbow into Nick’s soft side. “Well it’s very confusing, Grim.”

“ _Right_?” Nick throws his free hand up in consternation. “As in, first of all, marshmallows? On _potatoes_? When does _that_ get good? Explain Thanksgiving to me, Kloss. I am confused and terrified.”  

Karlie laughs and latches onto the subject with vigor, following Nick’s argument back into the house. 

 

 

“Taylor said you lived up north?” Karlie indents the edge of her pie crust and watches Andrea Swift pour pumpkin into a shell. “Where is that, Maine?” 

“Canada, my dear,” Andrea says. “The Maine packs are well-established, but there’s plenty of space left in Canada. We keep telling Taylor, you know, it’s going to get harder and harder every year. I’ve heard about your troubles with the Ossipee Pack, and the locals won’t like it either.” Andrea tsks and shakes her head sadly. “Not that it was an easy decision to move, mind. Taylor’s dad’s family has lived here for generations.” 

“Taylor thinks that’s why we need to stay,” Karlie says softly, watching Taylor set the table in the other room. “You know, because it’s home.” 

Andrea’s face softens. “Yes. She’s always been very headstrong. Taylor knows what she wants and, you know, that’s that. She’ll get it.” 

Karlie does her best not to think about how Taylor looks at her sometimes, in the evenings or early mornings. She wants to give Taylor everything she wants. She just — she hopes Taylor wants _her_. 

No one uses the formal dining room except for holidays, when they need seats for their eighteen assorted guests and a full dozen turkeys to for the wolves to eat down to the bone. The conversation dwells on werewolf registration laws and territory mandates and all sorts of obscure political wolf subjects that leave Karlie feeling unbelievably new to the game. She edges towards the kids table. 

“So,” says Andrea, halfway through dessert, “What’s the update about the Ossipee Pack?” 

“It’s handled, Mom,” Taylor says calmly, passing the pumpkin pie to her left. 

“Even after what happened at the bar? Taylor.” Andrea clucks. “We’re just worried, honey.” 

Moti Haim shakes his head, disgruntled. “You brought in a witch and they’re still pressing up against your borders? This is not a good sign.”

“Well, I’m barely a witch,” Nick says, deliberately airy. “Practically a hedgewizard. Barely potent at all. Just here for tourism, actually. I love me some winter-time sport. Laddy bit of ice dancing, that’s my area.” 

“We’ll handle it, Mom. You don’t have to worry.” Taylor’s shoulders rise towards her ears. “The Ossipee Pack isn’t anything I can’t deal with.” 

Karlie eyes Taylor’s tense face and clears her throat. “What are the wolf-related laws in Canada, Andrea? I’m really curious. I haven’t heard anything about them before.” 

“Oh, of course, honey — you’re so new!” Andrea smiles at her and starts explaining something about French settlers. From across the table, Taylor mouths _thank you_. 

The Swifts and Haims and Gomezes peel out on Friday morning, waving tearful goodbyes to the young pack in their wake. 

“Could have gone worse,” Selena reasons, pulling her jacket tight against the chilly wind. 

“They still don’t fully believe I’m an alpha.” Taylor keeps waving as they disappear down the long drive. “I need them to trust me on this. If I can’t convince my own _family_ …” 

“They just worry,” Karlie says, hugging Taylor around the waist. “That’s what parents do.” She doesn’t think she’s imagining the faint red glow that blooms along Taylor’s hairline, but she can’t be sure. 

“I know. We just — _I_ have to get this handled.” Taylor sighs heavily. “I’ll start negotiations with Jason again. God, he’s such a _dick_.” 

“Grade A distilled llama dick,” Este adds helpfully. “Side of dick relish.” 

“Trucker hats, what is this, 1999? Are we about to be Punked?” 

Este snorts at her sister. “Alonzo, how old were you in 1999?” 

“Eight,” Alana admits, “But I have a _great_ memory, dude, shut up.” 

 

 

In December, the lake freezes weeks earlier than expected. 

Alana pulls Karlie upstairs and yanks open a closet door in the hallway. “I don’t think they’ve cleaned this out, like, ever,” she says, and starts pulling out abandoned cold weather gear: turquoise snow pants, yellow and hot pink parkas, violently violet one pieces with teal diagonal stripes, cross country skis propped up against the wall and broken snowshoes lingering under holey jumpers. Alana jokingly tugs a toddler’s snow overalls over her shins and waddles from wall to wall. The closet smells of mothballs and the seventies. 

It’s such a _family_ closet that Karlie’s heart clenches a little bit, thinking of the front hall closet in her parents’ home where right hand gloves and assorted unflattering hats reside. 

The only ski pants that fit Karlie must have belonged to Taylor’s dad or her grandfather and she finds a ski sweater in a fetching shade of poop brown with strips of purple satin over the shoulders. Karlie rifles through the top shelf rows of increasingly ancient ice skates until she finds a pair that look like they’ll fit her: dark leather mens hockey skates with broken laces. 

They tramp down to the edge of the lake and lace up their borrowed skates, watching Nick and Harry topple over each other like wobbly baby deer in the center of the lake. Taylor’s peels of laughter ring over the ice. 

Once Karlie’s ancient skates feel like they may not disintegrate with her in them, she takes off. She hasn’t skated since she was eleven or twelve but her body always remembers, and within a minute or so her muscles take over and she’s flying over bumpy lake ice faster, faster, joy pulsing through her like blood. _This_ she can do. The body always remembers. 

“I hate you,” calls Este, who looks distinctly wobbly towards the edge of the lake. “I miss California!” 

Karlie just laughs and keeps skating, arms outstretched wide. 

It takes a minute for her to figure out how to stop, how to do those quick turns that’ll halt the breakneck momentum, but once she does she’s skating circles around Taylor like an excited sheepdog, herding her so she can’t go too far. Taylor laughs hysterically and tries to break past her, their puffy outfits bumping against each other like marshmallows. They bump so much they finally topple over in a heap of polyester and giggling and they lie there, kicking their legs up with the stupid euphoria of it. The ice is cold and the air is fresh and Karlie feels happy, just _happy_.

“I love it here,” Karlie says, beaming up at the bright sun. “Let’s never leave.” 

“Karlie, you’re just — sunshine. You’re pure sunshine.” Taylor takes Karlie’s face in both hands and rests their foreheads together. For a moment, Karlie is sure they’re going to kiss. She can feel Taylor’s breath on her face, smell her flowery-scented hair and the sweet sweat of her body. She leans forward and — it’s over. Taylor brushes her cheek again and stands up. 

Karlie watches her go. She watches her precise movements, watches her take Este’s arm and help her cross the lake without falling. Karlie gets up and skates in reckless long circles, faster and faster, like a wolf chasing its prey. 

After lunch Karlie takes off for the now-familiar mountains: hardwoods at lower altitudes: oak and maple, pine, hemlock and cedar. Knots of birch trees thicken as she climbs, giving way finally to thickets of spruce and fir, so thick Karlie has to duck and weave through the knotted underbrush. 

The air is cold and sharp and bites the inside of her nose. It will snow soon. Karlie can feel the incoming frost like she can feel which way is north, that strange gut pull of _knowing_ that lets her find Taylor on the dock, five miles southeast at the house. 

Somewhere near the peak of one of the Three Sisters Karlie smells cologne and warm human scent and _pack._ Nose prickling, she follows the trail to a granite overlook on the south side of the mountain.

“Hiya Klossy,” Nick says, without turning around. Faint colors swirl around Nick’s arms and torso like the Northern Lights, green and blue and magenta pink. 

Karlie hangs back. The magic smells weird, like sandalwood and sparklers on the Fourth of July. “Should I give you a minute?” 

“Would you please? I’ll be just a sec.” 

Karlie crouches down and hugs her knees, watching Nick warp the lights into iridescent braids. He sends them to twine around tall pine trees and low piles of rock and grows new ones, yellow and gold pouring from his fingertips. He’s talking, too, and the wind carries snippets of the rough strange language back to Karlie’s ears. She thinks she should be afraid. She’s not. 

“All right, then,” Nick says, and brushes his hands off like he’s just made a sandwich rather than forced the forces of nature to bend to his will. “Now that’s sorted. How can I help you?” 

“What language was that?” 

“Mostly Latin,” Nick says. He makes a face. “In this country you are more civilized and speak exciting Native Tongues and, like, Spanish and stuff. In Britain they teach us the dead language of too bloody many verb conjugations. A nightmare, I’ll tell you.” 

“What, did you have to learn Latin in Hogwarts?” Karlie grins, picturing a little freckly Nick in big black robes. “Were you a Gryffindor?” 

“Please,” Nick scoffs. “My apprenticeship had _far_ less of a death rate.” He settles down on the rock next to her and stomps his feet a bit to keep them warm. “Now tell me what’s ailing you.” 

“I was just hiking,” Karlie says, and Nick fixes her with a skeptical look. “I was! I wanted to clear my head.” 

“Ah, a solitary moody walk in frigid winter temperatures. Indicative of no trouble whatsoever. Just a natural, normal evening activity.” Nick shakes his head kindly and offers her his neon pink water bottle. “Go on, hydrate.” 

The water is clean and cool, tasting faintly of iron. “Thanks,” she says, and hands it back. 

“Cor, it’s bloody Siberia out here,” Nick grumbles, and pulls his puffer coat tighter against the wind. “Advantage to your werewolf business, eh?” 

“Yeah. I don’t seem to get cold much anymore,” she says. They’re quiet for a long moment, just listening to the water and the wind and the way the leaves quake. Karlie wonders what it sounds like to Nick, and his semi-human ears. It’s all so vivid to her now and she can’t remember what it was like before, to breath through her nose and not almost _feel_ the damp earthy ground, the sharp tingle of pine, the cut of new snow and frost on the mountain peaks. 

“It’s not that she’s not interested,” Nick informs her, and Karlie freezes. 

“I don’t — what?” 

“Swifty’s the cautious type, you understand. She had some rough dalliances back in the day and now she… I expect she’s trying out self-abnegation for size. Like a very beautiful monk.” Nick shakes his head. “It won’t last. She’s a lover not a… nun-er.” 

Karlie thunks her head down on her knees. “Am I that obvious?” 

“A little bit,” Nick says kindly. 

“Oh _god,_ ” Karlie groans. She thinks perhaps she may just die up here on this rock and let herself be blown away by the wind, disappear into the White Mountains without a trace. 

“If it makes you feel any better, Taylor is at the very least as obvious as you are. Maybe more so. Oh, she thinks she is so cunning.” Nick’s laugh wheezes at the ends. “Our little Swifty. You see, Miss Kloss, once upon a time I too was in love with my best friend. Horrible, rubbish, the worst idea ever, but you know, it ended rather well despite it all.” 

“I’m not her best friend.” 

Nick gives her a look like, _please don’t argue. I’m an all-knowing witch and I’ve been around a few mystical blocks_. 

“I thought Selena was her best friend.” 

“Nearly everyone is Swifty’s best friend. She’s lovely like that.” Nick puts a warm arm around Karlie’s back and squeezes her tight. “I expect Taylor thinks she’s doing the right thing by the pack in denying herself, you know, romance and joy and adorable picnics by the lake. Sometimes, you’ll just have to show her the error of her ways.” 

“I _want_ her,” Karlie says, frustrated. The word has so much in it. _Want_. She wants Taylor spread beneath her, wants to feel every inch of her body and bury her face in Taylor’s stomach. She wants to sit tangled together in front of the fire and run her hands over Taylor’s smooth legs. She wants to let Taylor pin her down and do whatever she likes, she wants to pin _Taylor_ down and touch her lightly, over and over until Taylor is gasping and red-faced. She wants to kiss her in the morning. She wants to hold her hand. She wants to chop the vegetables for Taylor’s stews and flick flour on her nose when they’re making cookies. She wants to sit on the dock together and tell her she loves her, she _loves_ her; she wants to hunt with their wolf bodies side by side until they’re too old to run.

“I know, love,” Nick tells her, and he rubs her back in smooth warm circles. “I know.”  

 

 

December’s full moon, known alternately as the Cold Moon and the Long Night Moon, hits the pack mid-month. The days flicker like brief sparklers before shorting out into the long, dark evenings of a northern winter. The sun sets at four in the afternoon and doesn’t rise until seven the next morning, leaving the human population sleepy and indoor-oriented. Not the pack. The wolves are winter creatures: they run for hours, crossing the mountains and howling missives to each other and warnings to the packs outside their boundaries. 

Karlie still can’t shift at will, so Taylor has stashed the truck by the river, assuming that’s where they’d end up running. The rest of the pack takes off on four paws in the cool light of the morning, leaving Taylor to toss Karlie an old high school sweatshirt and track pants and drive her home. 

Taylor drives carefully, intently, with her hands perched at two and ten. She glances over at Karlie. “Do you know what you look like, as a wolf?” 

Karlie shakes her head. 

“You have tawny fur,” Taylor says, and holds her hand out in between the seats, taller than her shoulder sitting down. “Tall, like usual. Like a very high ceiling.” 

“You’re all white,” Karlie says, and Taylor laughs. 

“Yeah, my whole family is. White bread. Good camouflage in the snow, though.” She turns left at the Episcopal church.  “I was baptized there,” she says, nodding at the white clapboard building. 

“Baptized? As a werewolf? Sorry — wolfblood? They let you do that?” 

Taylor shrugs. “New Hampshire has always been more open to wolfbloods. I’m not sure why. Maybe because people here sort of hate everyone equally, you know. The government, tourists, whatever. They’re not big on rules. Put it right there on the license plate: live free or die.” 

“Die, because you’re not wearing a seatbelt.” 

“Quite,” laughs Taylor. “Personally, I am _all about_ the rules. I am pro-seatbelt law, honestly, but wolfbloods aren’t exactly the run for office types.”   

“You’d be great at it,” Karlie says. She can just see her: Senator Swift. Governor Swift. She’s pretty sure Taylor could do anything she sinks her teeth into. 

Taylor’s face shutters a bit, darkens like the lake under cloud cover. 

“Negotiations?” Karlie guesses, and Taylor nods. 

“They’re so _male_ about it, you know? Dude alphas always get like that. They always want to fight about it instead of negotiating like we’re _meant_ to. They think the lax laws here mean that it’s their _right_ to fuck with everybody, and no thought to the cost.” Taylor glowers at the road ahead, eyebrows furrowed. “I know, I know. _Not all men_.” 

Karlie laughs. “I wasn’t arguing,” she says, and reaches across the truck bench to touch Taylor’s shoulder. “I know you’re frustrated. I don’t mind. Anyway, I like our girls only werewolf pack, with token Harry.” 

“As long as he knows his place,” Taylor notes, smirking. 

“Yup. Boy’s gotta stay in line if he knows what’s good for him.” Karlie shakes her fist menacingly. “We could take away his blender privileges. See how happy he is without his precious kale.” 

 

 

Karlie finds Taylor in the study stringing popcorn and cranberries on a long thread, examining a map of the White Mountains. A pencil rests to the right of the paper, perfectly sharpened. 

Without asking, Karlie starts arranging the popcorn and cranberries for easier reach. 

“Ossipee wants more land,” Taylor says, nodding at the map. “Formally, they asked me. They say they’re gaining members and need more space. They want to push our borders north into the Valley and take the remainder.” 

The map is an old topographic one, like an illustration in a fantasy novel. Karlie traces the Swift River with one finger, imagining the cool water rushing under her skin. “What do you think?” 

Taylor frowns at the map, tracing the dotted pencil lines that must signify pack borders. “I think it’s a short-term solution. We have the Valley below the river, Crawford Notch takes the remainder, and if we shift all the packs will have to move north, or relinquish territory. Crawford Notch is twice our size and more experienced. We can’t boss them into it.” 

“Even you?” Karlie fixes Taylor with a smirk. “Miss Hermione Granger?” 

“Shut up,” laughs Taylor, and pelts her with stray popcorn. 

Karlie’s not sure what compels her — Taylor’s anxious fidgeting, maybe, or the way her smile doesn’t seem to reach her eyes — but she takes Taylor’s face in two hands like she has any right to touch her, she holds Taylor’s cheeks and runs her thumbs over her cheekbones. “It is all going to be okay,” she says, looking Taylor square in her blue blue blue eyes. “We are going to work this out, and it is all going to be okay.” 

Taylor just looks back. The quiet between them is soft and fine as gossamer, thin as a spun spiderweb. Karlie’s heart pounds. She snatches her hands away, face going hot. “I — uh, god. Sorry, I —”

She never gets a chance to finish her apology because before she can get it out, Taylor has taken Karlie’s face in her hands and is kissing her, soft and sweet and smelling of dried fruit and skin. Karlie loses her breath, touches Taylor’s soft hair, her shoulder, her hand. She feels like she could fall right into Taylor like a stone into a still pond. 

“Is the door locked?” Karlie asks. 

Taylor shakes her head.

“Well, maybe we should lock it.” Karlie grins, the corduroy of Taylor’s pants soft under her fingertips. “I want to give you an early Christmas present.” 

When they’re finished, they sit tangled together in the office armchair, picking at the popcorn and staring down at the map. 

“I have to decide what to do,” Taylor says, pressing her face into the side of Karlie’s neck. “I have to go to them with an answer within the week.” 

Karlie breathes slowly, smelling the musk and salt of Taylor’s skin, the sour sweet cranberries and burnt popcorn. Everything feels soft and hazy and hardly real, except the rabbit beat of Taylor’s nervous heart. Taylor needs her pack to succeed. She needs it so badly because she wants to save them all, prove everyone wrong, be the best alpha in the whole damn country. Karlie smiles despite herself. Taylor will never stop reaching, working, helping. Karlie’s never been more sure of another person before. 

“I think you want to refuse them,” Karlie says, kissing Taylor’s forehead, “Maybe you should. Tell them to look east or west and negotiate with those packs, but they can’t go north towards us.”

“They’re growing,” Taylor says, eyeing the map. 

“Tell them we’re growing too.” Karlie tells Taylor about what she’d been told, the rumor that passed from New Hampshire out to her grade school friend from New York, that a women only — nearly — pack was growing near the White Mountains. “There have to be more girls like me out there, right? Girls who want a place to go.” 

“Not exactly like you, or we’re going to have some confusing adventures.” Taylor pinches Karlie’s side lightly. 

“Like the Parent Trap,” Karlie says, then frowns. She used to watch that with her sisters all the time. They wore out the VHS tape when Karlie was seven. 

Taylor laces their fingers together gently. “Have you called home yet?” 

“No. I’m not ready.” Karlie looks down at their hands, long fingers and bitten nails. 

“Okay,” Taylor says, and holds her tightly. 

Taylor doesn’t understand about Karlie and her family, not really. Taylor was born wolfblood and doesn’t know how she could wake up one morning and be a whole other species, has never lived outside a pack, doesn’t see how twisted people’s opinions can get if they don’t know the whole truth of a situation. Taylor never felt that Fox News fear, monsters hiding in every dark corner. She doesn’t understand it, but she doesn’t try and pretend she does, and that’s all Karlie wants from her. 

It’s how Karlie knows Taylor’s the right pack leader. It’s why Karlie wants to find more lost wolves. 

“Refuse them,” Karlie urges her, “We can start looking right away.” 

“Okay. Okay!” Taylor sits up straight in her chair, face fixed on the map. “Let’s do this. What the hell.”

Karlie kisses her, because Taylor’s so happy, because she’s strong and beautiful, because she’s allowed to now. 

 

 

You can’t hide anything in a house full of werewolves. Harry gives Karlie a vehement thumbs up the minute he sees her, then taps his nose and smirks wickedly. Karlie throws her apple right at his head. Este pretends to swoon, Alana shouts something about protection and even Danielle cracks a smile. 

“See,” Nick says, noting the wolf reactions around him, “I told you it’d work out. No nunnery for Swifty.” 

“I guess so,” Karlie says, and fights down the flush of pride. 

Shyly, Taylor takes Karlie’s hand at dinner and for a moment, the table is peaceful and still. Then the entirety of the table unites in teasing the absolute stuffing out of both of them, because that’s what packs do. 

 

 

Winter is a lovers’ time. Karlie tries not to hibernate with Taylor, like, _excessively_ , but it’s difficult to tear herself away from Taylor’s big bed and the cosy nest of white covers. Taylor spends too much time worrying over the territorial map and Karlie spends the remainder trying to drive those thoughts out of Taylor’s head through an exciting array of new and interesting methods. 

“I used to think that love was this thing that had to be destructive,” Taylor says one morning, brushing hair out of Karlie’s eyes. Taylor has this gaze that looks right into a person and doesn’t look away. Maybe it’s an alpha thing. Karlie can only meet her eyes for a few seconds before blushing and babbling about something or another. “Like, if it was easy, if you weren’t crying and fighting it wasn’t real.” 

Karlie makes a face and Taylor laughs. “I know, right? Healthy.” 

A knock rings through the room, a sharp _one two_. 

“Who is it?” 

A choked sound, like a laugh and sob all tangled together. “Justin’s on the phone.” 

Karlie and Taylor yank on jeans and the first sweaters they see and go out to join Selena on the landing. Her round face is pale, lower lip quivering. “He makes me feel like I’m being irrational,” she says, wiping her eyes, “I don’t know how he _does_ that.” 

Taylor wraps Selena up in a hug. “Because he’s the _worst_ , Selena. You deserve so much better.” 

“Why did he call?” Karlie peers over the bannister. She can’t seen anyone down there but she can feel them nearby, strings quivering like a plucked guitar. 

Selena shrugs. “Pack business, I think, with, like, a prequel of fucking me up.” 

Taylor glances at Karlie and without a word they switch places, Karlie on Selena duty and Taylor free to go get the phone. Karlie gentles Selena down to the floor. They sit on the stairs and Karlie rubs Selena’s back as she talks.

“Justin never used to be like this,” Selena swears, sniffling. “I’m not an idiot, he really used to be different.” 

“I believe you,” Karlie says, and she does. She’s never really dated a boy but she remembers her sisters with similar stories, her high school friends whose boyfriends who went cold and distant during the school day only to thaw out at night. 

“He used to be so sweet,” Selena says. “We were juniors and he was my first love, you know? My first Valentine’s Day, my first date to a school dance. He was so nice, even though I was a wolfblood and he was human; he never acted scared of the pack when he came over. Then we graduated and he started hanging around with the Ossipee guys all the time, and he got _mean_ when he was with them and didn’t…” Selena sniffs, wiping her nose. “One day he called me all, _hey babe, guess who got bit_? Like I’d be happy for him, and not wonder, you know, the whole time we were dating was he just waiting to be a werewolf too? And two wolves in different packs, that’s…” Selena shrugs helplessly. “It’s not like you and Taylor. It’s complicated. If you’re in a serious relationship, like, one of you is going to have to change packs. You just _will_. And Justin didn’t think about that, and didn’t think about how I was always going to stay with the Swift River pack like what am I going to do? Join up with Ossipee and be made fun of all the time? You’ve met them, they’re —” 

“A bag of dicks?” Karlie suggests, gratified when Selena laughs wetly. 

“Yeah. Anyway, it’s been one big, super fun rollercoaster. Plus, everyone in town knows everything about it, or think that they do.” Selena pulls her sweatshirt sleeves down over her little hands. “I got really tired of all the so-called advice.” 

“I bet,” Karlie says. She’s about to launch into a pick-me-up speech about, like, girl power and independence when Taylor appears at the bottom of the stairs, looking rumpled and stressed. 

“They want an answer now.” Taylor stumbles up to sit at their feet, thunking her head down on Karlie’s knee. She rubs her forehead, eyes shut against the world. “They want to have a meeting between our packs and settle this. Failing that, they want to fight about it, which would… It’s 2015, guys, territory disputes _have_ to be settled by negotiation. What is this, Ye Olden Colonial Times? Do they _want_ the humans to freak out?” 

“I’d like to see them try and fight us,” Karlie says, making a fist and play-bumping Taylor’s chin. “I’ve got a mean uppercut. Try and take me.” 

Taylor’s smile wavers and collapses into a worried moue, and she turns her face further into Karlie’s lap. “They’ve got double the wolves, and they’re older than we are.” 

Karlie touches Taylor’s soft hair, the tender curve of her skull. “Yeah, but they’re mostly men, right?” 

“And let’s be real, they’re not that smart,” Selena chimes in, looking brighter. “It’s going to be fine, Tay.” 

They gather their pack, split up and drive: Taylor, Karlie and Alana in the battered Chevy; Selena, Este, Danielle and the boys in the Volkswagen. Selena lets Este take the wheel and Taylor watches them in the rear-view mirror like a mother checking if her baby is still sleeping. 

Karlie stares out the window at the skeletal hands of bare winter oaks and maples, the towering pines. In another part of the state, the glassy lake would be fringed with summer houses but this is wolfblood territory and has been for centuries. Developers are loathe to try and sell in a predator’s landscape, at least so far. One advantage to the scary stories. 

They pass lone clapboard houses, felled logs, dirt roads crusted with frost. Karlie closes her eyes and feels the tug of her pack around her. It’s irrational, but she thinks they’d dissolve without this place, without the roots that grow under blankets of pine needles and frost. Territory is so much more than an old wooden fence. 

The meeting place sits dead at the intersection of Ossipee and Swift River territory, in a loose area where no wolfbloods will ever reign. The big farmhouse where regional witches learn their trade stands like a monument at the edge of a field backed by a dilapidated graveyard. They’re the first to arrive which, Taylor says, is lucky. Point Swift River. 

Nick bounds out of the Volkswagen before any of the wolves and makes his way up to the house where an older woman stands on the porch, her hand shaded against the sun. She’s tall with dark skin, maybe mid-sixties, and wears a Manchester Monarchs sweatshirt over acid-wash jeans and battered brown hiking boots. The woman nods at Taylor, who nods back.

“That’s Linda Sadoques,” Taylor says. She gets slowly out of the truck, sniffing the air. “She’s the senior witch here. She’ll moderate for us.” 

“Uh-huh,” Karlie says, picturing Linda Sadoques in a referee jersey, holding up a red card and throwing Este out of the game for improper conduct. 

Taylor darts a smile her way. “She just polices the boundaries. If we end up shifting and doing this medieval style, she’s the one who makes sure we don’t take it out of the field and terrorize the civilians.”

“Sad,” Este says, coming up behind them and pouting with her entire face. “I love terrorizing the civilians. It’s my only joy in this life.” 

“Heads up,” Danielle says, nodding towards the road. “Incoming.” 

The Ossipee pack roars up in a cloud of ATVs and shiny SUVs, a hoard of techno music and bristling nerves. A couple of the younger ones growl in their direction before lining up with the rest of their pack on the opposite side of the field. 

“We had first ground,” Taylor mutters into Karlie’s ear, “Ha! Take that, Jason.” 

Linda Sadoques descends from her porch like Queen Elizabeth, and both packs go quiet. Wind whistles overhead as she makes her way to the space between the packs. 

“Puppies on the porch,” Linda Sadoques says, “You know the rules.” 

“That’s you, baby wolf,” Alana says, nudging Karlie’s hip. “No worries, we’ll see you after.” 

Taylor squeezes Karlie’s hand and then lets go and nods towards the porch. “Nick’ll look after you,” Taylor tells her, all confidence over shaky nerves. 

“Don’t overthink it,” Karlie says impulsively, catching Taylor’s hand again. “You’re the stronger pack leader. You’re more established. Walk in there like you’ve won and you _have_.” 

“I’ll try,” says Taylor, and attempts a smile. 

Karlie trudges off towards Nick. A couple of the young Ossipee wolves are arguing the call with Linda Sadoques  but eventually they bow to her judgement and slink off to the porch: three boys in their late teens, who sullenly cluster together as far from Nick and Karlie as they can manage in restricted space. 

“Have you ever seen one of these before?” Karlie gnaws her thumbnail, watching Taylor and Jason slowly approach each other in the middle. 

“Sure,” Nick says airily, “Like twenty to seventy-nine.” 

“So, two?” Karlie guesses. 

“Three,” Nick allows, and laughs. “It’ll be okay, Kloss. I’ve never seen one go to wolfy fight fun times. Just imagine it like a rather hairy Step Up: Take It to the Streets. Or, in our case, Step Up: Take It to the Field Outside Linda Sadoques’s Witchy Training House.”

Taylor and Jason are still talking at the center of the field, Taylor gesticulating wildly. “This is a lot less exciting from a distance,” Karlie says, drumming the porch railing. 

“People think supernatural politics are all fancy explosions and big teeth and fully miss that they are mostly super boring adventures in talking.”

“Good thing the news always cuts to the good bits, I guess,” Karlie says. “All they ever show are all-out wolf brawls.” 

“And miss out on all this exciting peaceful negotiation?” Nick sweeps a hand over the view in front of them. “This is some great entertainment right here.”

Jason and Taylor keep talking. At certain points one or both of them gets toothy or flashes yellow wolf eyes, followed immediately by both packs baying and tearing at the bit, but no one moves past their lines and each time the growls die down without incident. Karlie hoists herself up and sits on the railing, jittering one sneaker and wishing she was close enough to hear properly. The wind’s in the wrong direction. 

“Oh — hey, look,” Nick says. He points at Linda Sadoques, who is speaking firmly to both packs. “She wouldn’t talk unless they’ve settled. Do you think —”

“I don’t know,” Karlie says, craning her head, “I can’t see Taylor’s face, I’m not sure.” 

Jason whistles and the young wolves on the porch bolt over towards him. The Ossipee pack loads up and roars out without another word, leaving nothing behind them besides their particular smell and a cloud of dust kicked up from their tires. 

“Guess we know, then,” Nick comments mildly. 

The Swift River pack waits until the SUVs disappear from sight before letting go, whooping and jumping with their arms around each other. Karlie bounds down from the porch towards them and winds up with an armful of Taylor, all sweet flowery scent and skin. 

“It’s not a complete win,” Taylor says suddenly, pulling back to look Karlie in the eye. “I mean, it’s tenuous. We really need to add some pack members, this whole territory seniority thing will only hold so long, so —” 

“Oh my god, Taylor,” Karlie groans, shaking Taylor’s shoulders gently, “You just won, girl! Be victorious for a minute, come on.” 

Taylor’s smile blooms like a riotous sunflower. “Fine! We’re victorious. Victory! We’re the winners!” Taylor hops in place, taking Karlie with her. 

They drive home blasting pop music loud enough to shake the whole earth, and stop for donuts on the way. The mighty and victorious deserve jelly-filled glazeds, everyone knows that. 

 

 

After their tenuous win, winter seems cozier, more hospitable. Taylor goes overboard with Christmas decorations and makes them all string lights all over the many eaves of the house and switch even the casual plates to festive dish-ware, bowls and mugs with tiny prints of green holly and red berries. Karlie teases her for the mistletoe and the clock that plays carols and the little Christmas elves stashed on every windowsill, but secretly she loves it all. Taylor seems to have around eight-hundred very specific traditions that must be performed at certain times and she’s always acquiring new ones. In a fortnight Taylor coins the Christmas Eve nightgown ritual and the twentieth of December cookie cutter extravaganza and one evening Karlie finds herself happily cutting out sugar cookie pineapples while wearing an old timey white nightgown, because that’s what you do during the Cookie Cutter Extravaganza, obviously. 

On Christmas Eve they get word that the parent pack are snowed in up in Canada, so it’s just the young wolves this year. Taylor makes the best of it, providing a massive feast for dinner and in the morning she hangs stockings for each one of them, even the Haim girls, who are Jewish and observe the festivities with a benign, slightly confused tolerance. 

“I don’t fuck with the Jeez but I sure do love footwear chocolate,” Este says, shaking the last of the Hershey’s kisses out of the toe of her knitted stocking. 

Alana nods emphatically, her mouth filled with chocolate orange. 

Selena and Taylor are on the love-seat thumbing through an old photo album, pointing out pictures of themselves as babies and laughing at their childhood fashion, while Danielle toys with her guitar, piecing together new arrangements of old carols, harmonizing with the clock when it chimes four in the afternoon with a rousing rendition of “We Wish You a Merry Christmas.” 

Harry thumbs his phone on and sits up abruptly. “Oh, shit, gotta call my mum, it’s like… late there.” 

“You’re a terrible son,” Nick says, shifting so he’s no longer halfway on top of Harry, “I already called Eileen.”  

Harry makes a face at Nick and retreats into the study, his voice a low murmur. 

Karlie thinks about the Christmas tree back in St Louis. Her sisters unwrapped presents without her this morning. Christmas Eve Karlie and her mom used to hole up in the kitchen, baking pies and cookies and cakes, folding love in the pastry crust. She doesn’t know if one of her sisters took her place or if her mom just let the tradition go this holiday. Harry’s mother lives three thousand miles away and he still knows if she had turkey for dinner, if his sister liked her presents, what funny thing the cat did to the Christmas tree. There’s an ocean between Karlie and her family now just as big as the Atlantic, salt and spray and blue black depth. 

“Sometimes it just takes time.” Nick smiles at Karlie and puts his hand over hers. Maybe it’s witchy intuition, or maybe just guessing, but he knows exactly what she’s dwelling on. “My old dad still pretends like I haven’t a drop of magical ability. He’s never said the word witch in his whole life, hand to the mother goddess and so on. But, you know, sometimes… Sometimes they’ll surprise you.” 

Karlie curls her toes in her festive reindeer socks — a gift from Taylor — and takes a steadying breath. “I want to call home, I do. I’m just scared.” 

“Then you should call them,” Nick says promptly. “Your pack will be here no matter what, you know that? Whatever happens.” Nick pats her hand and shifts to stand up, yawning. “Now let’s stop with the maudlin affair and have some leftovers, shall we? I love a turkey sandwich, me.” 

 

 

The new year dawns with gusts upon gusts of snow, burying the house in drifts up to its eaves. Canned goods star in all their meals until the plows can come through and there’s no reason not to stay in bed all morning, kissing and touching and letting the flashes of sun warm their naked skin. Karlie hasn’t worn real pants in almost a week. She feels like the cat, Pebbles, eschewing all tasks to curl up in the sun and doze. 

“Check out this _butt_ ,” Taylor says, smacking her bum lightly. “Karlie, this butt is not fair to other butts.” 

“Oh, shut up,” Karlie snorts, rolling away. 

“No, I’m serious. If there was a butt world championship, this butt would win by, like, a bazillion points.” 

“My butt and I thank you,” Karlie says with dignity. She lies back in the mountain of color-coordinated pillows, arching one hip to show off. Taylor laughs and tugs her back into a more comfortable position. 

Taylor’s windows hold a picture postcard view of the snow-covered lake, the forest and the mountains rising like rows of beasts beyond the tree line. It’s the alpha bedroom: the highest in the house with the best view, and it smells so strongly of Taylor that Karlie almost feels like she’s drowning in her. Most nights Karlie sleeps here, now, and she doesn’t know if that makes her Taylor’s mate or not. They haven’t had The Conversation. Karlie’s a little surprised, to be honest. She’d taken Taylor to be the sort of person who’d want to have The Conversation immediately, and then probably revisist it at three month intervals. 

“I want your butt. Both in a sexual and a fitness goals kind of way.” 

“You are such a nerd.” 

“Whatever, you’re into it,” Taylor says, and Karlie kisses Taylor’s collarbone, the tip of her shoulder, her cheek. Although she might want to, she’ll never kiss Taylor’s neck. Taylor’s the alpha: she bares her neck to nobody. Karlie’s wolf enough to know that. 

Love's a funny thing. For so long it felt so urgent, like a secret knocking at her ribs. Now Karlie feels so soft and simple that she could slip right into Taylor's body and nest there, warm like a hibernating thing in winter. Maybe it's the smell of her, the surety of pack bonds and the way Karlie always sits on Taylor's right now, even when they're just watching movies on the overstuffed living room couches. She's not sure they need The Conversation. Karlie's wolf knows her mate. 

 

 

Slowly the Swift River pack builds up their online presence. Este updates a Facebook page with pictures of the lake — Alana doing cannonballs off the dock, making Karlie itch for summer — and their cat, funny anecdotes about town gossip and liberal helpings of links to feminist essays. 

“We need to make sure we’re getting the cream of the crop, here,” Este explains, posting a photo of Beyoncé holding a football helmet on one shoulder, staring down the camera. 

The internet isn’t Karlie’s job. Karlie calls the werewolf helplines. She tells the operators her story, makes them promise to write down the number to the house, their email, the name of their Facebook group and pass it on if any new wolves sound scared, say they have nowhere to go. 

A few weeks pass with nothing, and then one afternoon Taylor shoots up from the sofa and crows, “New girl!” Karlie crowds her, trying to see her screen. Taylor waves her phone at Karlie long enough that she can glimpse a name: Zendaya Coleman. “Want to tell Este she’s got a new recruit to fetch? Looks like she’ll be in town tomorrow.” 

“Nah,” Karlie says, grinning. “I’ll go get her.” 

“New wolf,” Taylor says, wiggling her shoulders in Karlie’s direction, “New wolf, new wolf, new wolf!” 

There’s nothing Taylor likes more than collecting people, than gathering them into her house and saying _let’s be friends_. She wants to feed them and buy them presents and make them love her, and she wants to be the best alpha in the whole goddamn country. Karlie’s fairly invested in making sure that happens. 

The next afternoon she takes Selena’s Volkswagen and drives two hours south to Manchester, parks in the gravel parking lot and nods at the bartender on her way into the Luna. She spots Zendaya immediately: small and pretty, with her hair in long dreadlocks. She’s fiddling with her straw wrapper with her face screwed up on one side. One of the big guys is leaning over her table, talking to her in a low voice. 

“Hey, girl,” Karlie says, sliding into the open seat across from her. “This guy bothering you?” 

“Yeah, actually,” says Zendaya, her grin a relieved half moon. She can’t be older than seventeen, and the wolf in her is even younger. 

The guy makes an injured expression. “We were just talking, don’t have to be such a bitch about it.” 

“Mm, yes, I think we do, actually,” Karlie says, calm and cutthroat. She can feel the wolf in her with every breath of stale beer air. “Fuck off.” 

The guy puts his hands up like _whatever_ and goes off with a huff. Karlie wonders if he’s the same guy who gave her shit when she was new, the same guy Este scared off with a smile and a few words. It feels good to be that girl for someone else. 

Zendaya snorts. “Cool,” she says, watching the guy retreat back to his friends. “You’re in Taylor’s pack, right?” 

“Always.” Karlie holds her hand out across the small table to shake. “I’m so happy to meet you.” 

On the drive up to Swift River Karlie doesn’t bring up the possibility that Zendaya is a minor, and as such will be a whole lot of possible legal trouble or at least paperwork. She’ll talk to Taylor about it first and Taylor will probably draw up a byzantine list of options and make them all go through the list one by one. What’s important now is that Zendaya gets used to the smell of the pack, that she stops sending out twitchy little buzzes of fear and calms down. The rest can wait. 

 

 

After they get Zendaya settled in her new room, Karlie begs off late night Real Housewitches. Instead, she makes herself a snack — sausage wrapped in turkey, don’t knock it ’til you try it — sits in the old chair by the window, tucks her legs up under her chin and dials a familiar number on the old-fashioned rotary phone. 

“ _Hello_? _”_ says the voice on the other line, the voice that makes tears flood her eyes. The room goes blurry. She clutches the cord of the phone. “Hi,” she says, “Hi Mom.” 

 

 

It’s halfway to February before the first full moon of the new year: a Wolf Moon, when snow gathers deep in the woods and the howls of wolves can be heard in the clear, still air. Karlie endures the usual anticipation, jitters in her bones, howl tearing at her throat, the way the cat steers clear of the wolves in the house for a few days. 

The moon rises and the growing pack takes to the mountains, ice and granite beneath their paws. Taylor’s white fur melds into the snow that surrounds them, and Karlie runs at her right flank, close enough to bump against her shoulder if she gets a step wrong. The air smells clear and sharp as icicles. Here and there Karlie catches the scent of some slumbering animal: woodchucks deep in hibernation, a black bear and her two new cubs, half a dozen raccoons in a communal den. 

She’s never felt more aware as a wolf. 

They follow the track of a wounded deer halfway up Mount Whiteface and stumble upon a towering lump-nosed moose but he’s strong, doesn’t run and give them an opening, so the pack moves on. Karlie knows somehow — _knows_ , at the core of her, in the great red thumping heart of her — that a wolf needs large numbers and luck to take on a healthy moose, that three generations ago a moose killed a member of the pack, that since then the wolves of Swift River have been taught to be careful hunters. 

Karlie presses up against Taylor’s shoulder and runs, all of them together, one pack under the Wolf Moon. 


End file.
